HOME SICKNESS.
“And it’s hame, hame, hame,
Hame fain wad I be.”
It needed the pretty light papering of the rooms to reconcile them to
Milton. It needed more—more that could not be had. The thick yellow
November fogs had come on; and the view of the plain in the valley, made
by the sweeping bend of the river, was all shut out when Mrs. Hale
arrived at her new home.
Margaret and Dixon had been at work two days, unpacking and arranging,
but everything inside the house still looked in disorder; and outside a
thick fog crept up to the very windows, and was driven in to every open
door in choking white wreaths of unwholsome mist.
“Oh, Margaret! are we to live here?” asked Mrs. Hale in blank dismay.
Margaret’s heart echoed the dreariness of the tone in which this
question was put. She could scarcely command herself enough to say, “Oh,
the fogs in London are sometimes far worse!”
“But then you knew that London itself, and friends lay behind it.
Here—well! we are desolate. Oh Dixon, what a place this is!”
“Indeed, ma’am, I’m sure it will be your death before long, and then I
know who’ll—stay! Miss Hale, that’s far too heavy for you to lift.”
“Not at all, thank you, Dixon,” replied Margaret coldly. “The best thing
we can do for mamma is to get her room quite ready for her to go to bed,
while I go and bring her a cup of coffee.”
Mr. Hale was equally out of spirits, and equally came upon Margaret for
sympathy.
“Margaret, I do believe this is an unhealthy place. Only suppose that
your mother’s health or yours should suffer. I wish I had gone into some
country place in Wales; this is really terrible,” said he, going up to
the window.
There was no comfort to be given. They were settled in Milton, and must
endure smoke and fogs for a season; indeed, all other life seemed shut
out from them by as thick a fog of circumstance. Only the day before,
Mr. Hale had been reckoning up with dismay how much their removal and
fortnight at Heston had cost, and he found it had absorbed nearly all
his little stock of ready money. No! here they were, and here they must
remain.
At night when Margaret realised this, she felt inclined to sit down in a
stupor of despair. The heavy smoky air hung about her bedroom, which
occupied the long narrow projection at the back of the house. The
window, placed at the side of the oblong, looked at the blank wall of a
similar projection, not above ten feet distant. It loomed through the
fog like a great barrier to hope. Inside the room everything was in
confusion. All their efforts had been directed to make her mother’s room
comfortable. Margaret sat down on a box, the direction card upon which
struck her as having been written at Helstone—beautiful, beloved
Helstone! She lost herself in dismal thought: but at last she determined
to take her mind away from the present; and suddenly remembered that she
had a letter from Edith which she had only half read in the bustle of
the morning. It was to tell of their arrival at Corfu; their voyage
along the Mediterranean—their music, and dancing on board ship; the gay
new life opening upon her; her house with its trellised balcony, and its
views over white cliffs and deep blue sea.
Edith wrote fluently and well, if not graphically. She could not only
seize the salient and characteristic points of a scene, but she could
enumerate enough of indiscriminate particular for Margaret to make it
out for herself. Captain Lennox and another lately married officer
shared a villa, high up on the beautiful precipitous rocks overhanging
the sea. Their days, late as it was in the year, seemed spent in boating
or land-picnics; all out-of-doors, pleasure-seeking and glad, Edith’s
life seemed like the deep vault of blue sky above her, free—utterly
free from fleck or cloud. Her husband had to attend drill, and she, the
most musical officer’s wife there, had to copy the new and popular tunes
out of the most recent English music, for the benefit of the bandmaster;
those seemed their most severe and arduous duties. She expressed an
affectionate hope that, if the regiment stopped another year at Corfu,
Margaret might come out and pay her a long visit. She asked Margaret if
she remembered the day twelve-month on which she, Edith, wrote—how it
rained all day long in Harley Street; and how she would not put on her
new gown to go to a stupid dinner, and get it all wet and splashed in
going to the carriage; and how at that very dinner they had first met
Captain Lennox.
Yes! Margaret remembered it well. Edith and Mrs. Shaw had gone to
dinner. Margaret had joined the party in the evening. The recollection
of the plentiful luxury of all arrangements, the stately handsomeness of
the furniture, the size of the house, the peaceful, untroubled ease of
the visitors—all came vividly before her, in strange contrast to the
present time. The smooth sea of that old life closed up, without a mark
left to tell where they had all been. The habitual dinners, the calls,
the dancing evenings, were all going on, going on for ever, though her
Aunt Shaw and Edith were no longer there; and she, of course, was even
less missed. She doubted if any one of that old set ever thought of her,
except Henry Lennox. He too, she knew, would strive to forget her,
because of the pain she had caused him. She had heard him often boast of
his power of putting any disagreeable thought far away from him. Then
she penetrated farther into what might have been. If she had cared for
him as a lover, and had accepted him, and this change in her father’s
opinions and consequent station had taken place, she could not doubt but
that it would have been impatiently received by Mr. Lennox. It was a
bitter mortification to her in one sense; but she could bear it
patiently, because she knew her father’s purity of purpose, and that
strengthened her to endure his errors, grave and serious though in her
estimation they were. But the fact of the world esteeming her father
degraded, in its rough wholesale judgment, would have oppressed and
irritated Mr. Lennox. As she realised what might have been, she grew to
be thankful for what was. They were at the lowest now; they could not be
worse. Edith’s astonishment and her Aunt Shaw’s dismay would have to be
met bravely, when their letters came. So Margaret rose up and began
slowly to undress herself, feeling the full luxury of acting leisurely,
late as it was, after all the past hurry of the day. She fell asleep,
hoping for some brightness, either internal or external. But if she had
known how long it would be before the brightness came, her heart would
have sunk low down. The time of the year was most unpropitious to health
as well as to spirits. Her mother caught a severe cold, and Dixon
herself was evidently not well, although Margaret could not insult her
more than by trying to save her, or by taking any care of her. They
could hear of no girl to assist her; all were at work in the factories;
at least, those who applied were well scolded by Dixon, for thinking
that such as they could ever be trusted to work in a gentleman’s house.
So they had to keep a charwoman in almost constant employ. Margaret
longed to send for Charlotte; but besides the objection of her being a
better servant than they now could afford to keep, the distance was too
great.
Mr. Hale met with several pupils, recommended to him by Mr. Bell, or by
the more immediate influence of Mr. Thornton. They were mostly of the
age when many boys would be still at school, but, according to the
prevalent, and, apparently well-founded notions of Milton, to make a lad
into a good tradesman he must be caught young, and acclimated to the
life of the mill, or office, or warehouse. If he were sent to even the
Scotch Universities, he came back unsettled for commercial pursuits: how
much more so if he went to Oxford or Cambridge, where he could not be
entered till he was eighteen? So most of the manufacturers placed their
sons in situations at from fourteen or fifteen years of age, unsparingly
cutting away all off-shoots in the direction of literature or high
mental cultivation, in hopes of throwing the whole strength and vigour
of the plant into commerce. Still there were some wiser parents; and
some who had sense enough to perceive their own deficiencies, and strive
to remedy them. Nay, there were a few no longer youths, but men in the
prime of life, who had the stern wisdom to acknowledge their own
ignorance, and to learn late what they should have learnt early. Mr.
Thornton was perhaps the oldest of Mr. Hale’s pupils. He was certainly
the favourite. Mr. Hale got into the habit of quoting his opinions so
frequently, and with such regard, that it became a little domestic joke
to wonder what time, during the hour appointed for instruction, could be
given to absolute learning, so much of it appeared to have been spent in
conversation.
Margaret rather encouraged this light, merry way of viewing her father’s
acquaintance with Mr. Thornton, because she felt that her mother was
inclined to look upon this new friendship of her husband’s with jealous
eyes. As long as his time had been solely occupied with his books and
his parishioners, as at Helstone, she had appeared to care little
whether she saw much of him or not; but now that he looked eagerly
forward to each renewal of his intercourse with Mr. Thornton, she seemed
hurt and annoyed, as if he were slighting her companionship for the
first time. Mr. Hale’s over-praise had the usual effect of over-praise
upon his auditors; they were a little inclined to rebel against
Aristides being always called the Just.
After a quiet life in a country parsonage for more than twenty years,
there was something dazzling to Mr. Hale in the energy which conquered
immense difficulties with ease; the power of the machinery of Milton,
the power of the men of Milton, impressed him with a sense of grandeur,
which he yielded to without caring to inquire into the details of its
exercise. But Margaret went less abroad, among machinery and men; saw
less of power in its public effect, and, as it happened, she was thrown
with one or two of those who, in all measures affecting masses of
people, must be acute sufferers for the good of many. The question
always is, has everything been done to make the sufferings of these
exceptions as small as possible? or, in the triumph of the crowded
procession, have the helpless been trampled on, instead of being gently
lifted aside out of the roadway of the conqueror, whom they have no
power to accompany on his march?
It fell to Margaret’s share to have to look out for a servant to assist
Dixon, who had at first undertaken to find just the person she wanted to
do all the rough work of the house. But Dixon’s ideas of helpful girls
were founded on the recollection of tidy elder scholars at Helstone
school, who were only too proud to be allowed to come to the parsonage
on a busy day, and treated Mrs. Dixon with all the respect, and a good
deal more of fright, which they paid to Mr. and Mrs. Hale. Dixon was not
unconscious of this awed reverence which was given to her; nor did she
dislike it: it flattered her much as Louis the Fourteenth was flattered
by his courtiers shading their eyes from the dazzling light of his
presence. But nothing short of her faithful love for Mrs. Hale could
have made her endure the rough independent way in which all the Milton
girls, who made application for the servant’s place, replied to her
inquiries respecting their qualifications. They even went the length of
questioning her back again; having doubts and fears of their own, as to
the solvency of a family who lived in a house of thirty pounds a-year,
and yet gave themselves airs, and kept two servants, one of them so very
high and mighty. Mr. Hale was no longer looked upon as Vicar of
Helstone, but as a man who only spent at a certain rate. Margaret was
weary and impatient of the accounts which Dixon perpetually brought to
Mrs. Hale of the behaviour of these would-be servants. Not but what
Margaret was repelled by the rough uncourteous manners of these people;
not but what she shrunk with fastidious pride from their hail-fellow
accost, and severely resented their unconcealed curiosity as to the
means and position of any family who lived in Milton, and yet were not
engaged in trade of some kind. But the more Margaret felt impertinence,
the more likely she was to be silent on the subject; and, at any rate,
if she took upon herself to make inquiry for a servant, she could spare
her mother the recital of all her disappointments and fancied or real
insults.
Margaret accordingly went up and down to butchers and grocers, seeking
for a nonpareil of a girl; and lowering her hopes and expectations every
week, as she found the difficulty of meeting with any one in a
manufacturing town who did not prefer the better wages and greater
independence of working in a mill. It was something of a trial to
Margaret to go out by herself in this busy bustling place. Mrs. Shaw’s
ideas of propriety and her own helpless dependence on others, had always
made her insist that a footman should accompany Edith and Margaret, if
they went beyond Harley Street or the immediate neighbourhood. The
limits by which this rule of her aunt’s had circumscribed Margaret’s
independence had been silently rebelled against at the time: and she had
doubly enjoyed the free walks and rambles of her forest life from the
contrast which they presented. She went along there with a boundless
fearless step, that occasionally broke out into a run, if she were in a
hurry, and occasionally was stilled into perfect repose, as she stood
listening to, or watching any of the wild creatures who sang in the
leafy courts, or glanced out with their keen bright eyes from the low
brushwood or tangled furze. It was a trial to come down from such motion
or such stillness, only guided by her own sweet will, to the even and
decorous pace necessary in streets. But she could have laughed at
herself for minding this change, if it had not been accompanied by what
was a more serious annoyance.
The side of the town on which Crampton lay was especially a thoroughfare
for the factory people. In the back streets around them there were many
mills, out of which poured streams of men and women two or three times a
day. Until Margaret had learnt the times of their ingress and egress,
she was very unfortunate in constantly falling in with them. They came
rushing along, with bold, fearless faces, and loud laughs and jests,
particularly aimed at all those who appeared to be above them in rank or
station. The tones of their unrestrained voices, and their carelessness
of all common rules of street politeness, frightened Margaret a little
at first. The girls, with their rough, but not unfriendly freedom, would
comment on her dress, even touch her shawl or gown to ascertain the
exact material; nay, once or twice she was asked questions relative to
some article which they particularly admired. There was such a simple
reliance on her womanly sympathy with their love of dress, and on her
kindliness, that she gladly replied to these inquiries, as soon as she
understood them; and half smiled back at their remarks. She did not mind
meeting any number of girls, loud spoken and boisterous though they
might be. But she alternately dreaded and fired up against the workmen,
who commented not on her dress, but on her looks, in the same open,
fearless manner. She, who had hitherto felt that even the most refined
remark on her personal appearance was an impertinence, had to endure
undisguised admiration from these outspoken men. But the very
outspokenness marked their innocence of any intention to hurt her
delicacy, as she would have perceived if she had been less frightened by
the disorderly tumult. Out of her fright came a flash of indignation
which made her face scarlet, and her dark eyes gather flame, as she
heard some of their speeches. Yet there were other sayings of theirs,
which, when she reached the quiet safety of home, amused her even while
they irritated her.
For instance, one day, after she had passed a number of men, several of
whom had paid her the not unusual compliment of wishing she was their
sweetheart, one of the lingerers added, “Your bonny face, my lass, makes
the day look brighter.” And another day, as she was unconsciously
smiling at some passing thought, she was addressed by a poorly-dressed,
middle-aged workman, with, “You may well smile, my lass; many a one
would smile to have such a bonny face.” This man looked so careworn that
Margaret could not help giving him an answering smile, glad to think
that her looks, such as they were, should have had the power to call up
a pleasant thought. He seemed to understand her acknowledging glance,
and a silent recognition was established between them whenever the
chances of the day brought them across each other’s paths. They had
never exchanged a word; nothing had been said but that first compliment;
yet somehow Margaret looked upon this man with more interest than upon
any one else in Milton. Once or twice, on Sundays, she saw him walking
with a girl, evidently his daughter, and, if possible, still more
unhealthy than he was himself.
One day Margaret and her father had been as far as the fields that lay
around the town; it was early spring, and she had gathered some of the
hedge and ditch flowers, dog-violets, lesser celandines, and the like,
with an unspoken lament in her heart for the sweet profusion of the
South. Her father had left her to go into Milton upon some business; and
on the road home she met her humble friends. The girl looked wistfully
at the flowers, and, acting on a sudden impulse, Margaret offered them
to her. Her pale blue eyes lightened up as she took them, and her father
spoke for her.
“Thank yo, Miss. Bessy’ll think a deal o’ them flowers; that hoo will;
and I shall think a deal o’ yor kindness. Yo’re not of this country, I
reckon?”
“No!” said Margaret, half sighing. “I come from the South—from
Hampshire,” she continued, a little afraid of wounding his consciousness
of ignorance, if she used a name which he did not understand.
“That’s beyond London, I reckon? And I come fro’ Burnleyways, and forty
miles to th’ North. And yet, yo see, North and South has both met and
made kind o’ friends in this big smoky place.”
Margaret had slackened her pace to a walk alongside of the man and his
daughter, whose steps were regulated by the feebleness of the latter.
She now spoke to the girl, and there was a sound of tender pity in the
tone of her voice as she did so that went right to the heart of the
father.
“I’m afraid you are not very strong.”
“No,” said the girl, “nor never will be.”
“Spring is coming,” said Margaret, as if to suggest pleasant, hopeful
thoughts.
“Spring nor summer will do me good,” said the girl quietly.
Margaret looked up at the man, almost expecting some contradiction from
him, or at least some remark that would modify his daughter’s utter
hopelessness. But instead, he added—
“I’m afeared hoo speaks the truth. I’m afeared hoo’s too far gone in a
waste.”
“I shall have a spring where I am boun’ to, and flowers, and amaranths,
and shining robes besides.”
“Poor lass, poor lass!” said her father in a low tone. “I’m none so sure
o’ that; but it’s a comfort to thee, poor lass, poor lass. Poor father!
it’ll be soon.”
Margaret was shocked by his words—shocked but not repelled; rather
attracted and interested.
“Where do you live? I think we must be neighbours, we meet so often on
this road.”
“We put up at nine Frances Street, second turn to th’ left at after
yo’ve past th’ Goulden Dragon.”
“And your name? I must not forget that.”
“I’m none ashamed o’ my name. It’s Nicholas Higgins. Hoo’s called Bessy
Higgins. Whatten yo’ asking for?”
Margaret was surprised at this last question, for at Helstone it would
have been an understood thing, after the enquiries she had made, that
she intended to come and call upon any poor neighbour whose name and
habitation she had asked for.
“I thought—I meant to come and see you.” She suddenly felt rather shy
of offering the visit, without having any reason to give for her wish to
make it, beyond a kindly interest in a stranger. It seemed all at once
to take the shape of an impertinence on her part; she read this meaning
too in the man’s eyes.
“I’m none so fond of having strange folk in my house.” But then
relenting, as he saw her heightened colour, he added, “Yo’re a foreigner,
as one may say, and maybe don’t know many folk here, and yo’ve given my
wench here flowers out of yo’r own hand;—yo may come if yo like.”
Margaret was half amused, half-nettled at this answer. She was not sure
if she would go where permission was given so like a favour conferred.
But when they came to the turn into Frances Street, the girl stopped a
minute, and said,
“Yo’ll not forget yo’re to come and see us.”
“Aye, aye,” said the father, impatiently, “hoo’ll come. Hoo’s a bit set
up now, because hoo thinks I might ha’ spoken more civilly; but hoo’ll
think better on it, and come. I can read her proud bonny face like a
book. Come along, Bess; there’s the mill bell ringing.”
Margaret went home, wondering at her new friends, and smiling at the
man’s insight into what had been passing in her mind. From that day
Milton became a brighter place to her. It was not the long, bleak sunny
days of spring, nor yet was it that time was reconciling her to the town
of her habitation. It was that in it she had found a human interest.